Internship - Search Machine Learning Engineer

Perplexity AI, Inc.

Job Overview

Location

Remote

Job Type

Full-time

Full Job Description

📋 Description

• Join Perplexity as a Search Machine Learning Engineer Intern and play a pivotal role in shaping the future of advanced search technologies. This internship offers a unique opportunity to dive deep into the core of search, with a specific emphasis on retrieval and ranking systems, contributing directly to how millions of users find and interact with information.
• You will be an integral part of a dynamic team, working hand-in-hand with seasoned engineers who are at the forefront of ML innovation. Your contributions will be instrumental in enhancing search quality, exploring and implementing cutting-edge models, and deploying features that have a tangible impact on user experience.
• This is a full-time, 12 to 24-week internship program, offering an immersive experience within our Belgrade office. You'll gain invaluable hands-on experience in a collaborative and fast-paced environment, learning best practices from industry leaders.
• Your primary responsibilities will involve contributing to a series of experiments designed to elevate search quality. This includes developing and refining models, optimizing data utilization, and building robust evaluation tools, all under the expert guidance of senior engineers.
• You will have the opportunity to design and implement critical components of our search platform and model stack. This encompasses working on retrieval mechanisms that efficiently find relevant information, ranking algorithms that order results by importance, and classification models that categorize and understand content.
• A significant part of your role will be dedicated to training and evaluating models, including exploring advanced Large Language Model (LLM)-based approaches. These models are crucial for tasks such as improving retrieval accuracy, enhancing ranking precision, and refining classification capabilities.
• You will also support the deployment and ongoing monitoring of search and ranking models. This involves ensuring these systems are not only scalable to handle massive amounts of data and user traffic but also performant, delivering results quickly and efficiently.
• Furthermore, you will contribute to the development and iteration of Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) pipelines. These pipelines are essential for grounding search results and generating accurate, contextually relevant answers, bridging the gap between information retrieval and natural language generation.
• Collaboration is key at Perplexity. You will work closely with cross-functional teams, including Data Scientists, AI Researchers, Infrastructure Engineers, and Product Managers. This collaborative approach ensures that improvements are delivered rapidly and that you gain exposure to the entire lifecycle of production ML systems.
• This internship is more than just a learning opportunity; it's a chance to make a real impact. You'll be contributing to a product used by millions, solving complex problems in information retrieval and AI, and growing your skills in a supportive and challenging environment.
• We encourage a proactive and curious mindset. You'll be expected to take ownership of your tasks, demonstrate a strong willingness to learn and adapt, and thrive in an environment that values innovation and rapid iteration.
• By the end of this internship, you will have a comprehensive understanding of building and deploying large-scale search systems, practical experience with state-of-the-art ML techniques, and a portfolio of contributions to a widely used product.
• This role is ideal for individuals passionate about the intersection of search, AI, and machine learning, who are eager to apply their academic knowledge to real-world challenges and contribute to building the future of information discovery.

🎯 Requirements

• Strong foundation in machine learning and statistics, demonstrated through coursework or projects related to information retrieval, ranking, or recommender systems.
• Proficiency in Python and experience with common ML frameworks such as PyTorch, TensorFlow, or JAX, evidenced by academic, open-source, or personal projects.
• Familiarity with evaluating model quality using offline metrics and/or A/B testing (highly desirable).
• Previous experience (internships, research, or significant projects) working on search, recommendation, or Natural Language Processing (NLP) (highly desirable).
• Experience with Rust (a plus).

🏖️ Benefits

• Gain hands-on experience in building and deploying cutting-edge search and ML systems at scale.
• Work closely with experienced engineers and researchers in a collaborative and fast-paced startup environment.
• Opportunity to contribute to a product used by millions of users worldwide.
• Develop practical skills in areas like information retrieval, ranking, LLMs, and RAG pipelines.
• Immerse yourself in a culture of innovation, learning, and rapid iteration.

Skills & Technologies

Python

Rust

TensorFlow

PyTorch

Junior

Remote

Ready to Apply?

Apply Externally

You will be redirected to an external site to apply.

Perplexity AI, Inc.

Visit Website

About Perplexity AI, Inc.

Perplexity AI operates an AI-powered conversational search engine that answers queries by synthesizing live web information. The platform combines large language models with real-time retrieval, citing sources for transparency. Founded in 2022, the San Francisco-based company offers free and subscription tiers, mobile apps, and browser extensions, targeting consumers and enterprises seeking accurate, verifiable answers instead of traditional link lists.

View Company Profile